COPPER MOUNTAIN — The first leg of the road to the PyeongChang Olympics began this week in Copper Mountain’s perfectly sculpted halfpipe.

American skiers and snowboarders dominated the season’s first U.S. Grand Prix at Copper Mountain. kicking off a four-event Olympic qualifying stretch. Four U.S. men and four U.S. women advanced to Friday’s ski halfpipe finals. Seven U.S. men and five U.S. women advanced to Saturday’s snowboard halfpipe finals.

On Tuesday, Sochi gold medalist David Wise topped the qualifying field of almost 50 skiers. Winter Park 18-year-old Birk Irving, competing in one of the biggest contests of his life, qualified third, followed by Basalt’s Torin Yater Wallace. Crested Butte’s Aaron Blunck also qualified for the 10-skier finals on Friday. New Zealand’s Nico Porteous and Beau James Wells, Canada’s Mike Riddle and Simon D’Artois and France’s Benoit Valentin also will compete in the finals.

Five American women moved on to Friday’s eight-skier finals. Sochi veteran freeskier Devin Logan, aiming to compete in both women’s halfpipe and slopestyle in South Korea, finished second in Tuesday’s qualifying halfpipe contest. Sochi gold medalist Maddie Bowman qualified fourth, followed by Brita Sigourney, Annalisa Drew and Carly Margulies, the youngest member of U.S. Freeskiing’s halfpipe squad. China’s Kevin Zhang, France’s Marie Martinod and Germany’s Sabrina Cakmakli also will compete in Friday’s halfpipe finals.

Five American women qualified for the eight-rider snowboard halfpipe finals on Saturday. Maddie Mastro and Chloe Kim lead their heats. Four-time Olympian Kelly Clark, Steamboat Sochi veteran Arielle Gold and Elana Hight also advanced to finals. China’s Jiayu Liu, Japan’s Sena Tomita and France’s Mirabelle Thovex also will compete in the eight-rider finals.

Seven American men qualified for Saturday’s halfpipe finals. Oregon brothers Ben and Gabe Ferguson joined Louie Vito and Danny Davis in qualifying in the first heat. The second heat saw Shaun White, Chase Josey and Greg Bretz move on to finals, which will include Australia’s Scotty James and Japan riders Ayumu Hirano and Raibu Katayama.

Jason Blevins covers tourism, mountain business, skiing and outdoor adventure sports for both the business and sports sections at The Denver Post, which he joined in 1997. He skis, pedals, paddles and occasionally boogies in the hills and is just as inspired by the lively entrepreneurial spirit that permeates Colorado's high country communities as he is by the views.

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The swirl of political theater hasn’t filtered down to the Olympic hopefuls. These are young athletes with a much different risk assessment. They aren’t necessarily fretting socio-political drama while spinning and flipping down icy halfpipes and over 80-foot jumps.

Big air soared into the big time Sunday, with the first-ever snowboarding contest in U.S. Grand Prix history, a high-flying world cup competition that also served as the first step in Olympic qualifying for snowboarders seeking to compete in the sport’s debut in the PyeongChang Winter Games.